At least Ken listened. It was a start.
As the car passed through the wrought-iron gates, a tremendous explosion shattered the air, and the car erupted into an enormous, golden fireball he detonation knocked down dozens of pedestrians, shattering windows up to three blocks away.
Orange flames shot into the sky as the fuselage caught fire, sending the car’s chassis ten feet into the air. Molten debris rained across the street.
When the car crashed to earth, black smoke pouring from the windows, people gathered around the smoldering wreckage, whispering in hushed tones, hands over their mouths to stifle the horror. Cell phones were taken out, 911 immediately inundated with horrified callers. Most simply watched the car burn, gasping at the charred corpses inside. Wondering who’d fallen victim to such a ghastly fate.
Slowly one man began to make his way through the crowd. He was tall and his skin was pale. Thin, like he’d recently lost a tremendous amount of weight. His cheeks were sunken and he wore dark sunglasses, a thick black overcoat wrapped around his gaunt frame. He walked with a slight limp and held his right arm in a sling. The man stepped forward, carefully winding his way through the gaping onlookers. As he approached the twisted mass of destruction, the man removed something from his breast pocket. It was a picture, worn and tattered and smeared with red.
He pressed his lips to the photograph, then set it on the ground by the burning wreckage, just a few feet from the charred bodies inside.
Standing back up, the man coughed into his fist, and said two words.
For Anne.
